Head of Production Colin Pearsall Leaves 360i as Agency Moves to Restructure Team

Colin Pearsall, vp and head of integrated production at 360i, left the Dentsu agency’s New York headquarters this month, a spokesperson confirmed today.

According to several employees, the McCann veteran’s departure had been in the works for some time as he remained at 360i in a transitional role. The change also reportedly coincided with an ongoing restructuring of the organization’s creative and production departments following the arrival of CCO Menno Kluin from Deutsch approximately one year ago.

In a separate development, 360i also parted with head of project management Lili Hollandt.

“We believe in the power of production and project management to get great work out the door and look forward to building both capabilities, including hiring a kickass new head of production. We thank Colin and Lili for their contributions and wish them best of luck,” said an agency spokesperson.

360i has made some changes on the creative side in recent months. In May we noted that the company had parted ways with several members of its production department in a move described as an ongoing effort to develop “a more nimble approach to workflow.” Since then, we’ve heard from more individuals conveying a sense of uncertainty among the affected departments. Some expressed concern that 360i would be moving toward a model in which its production team consists primarily of freelancers working on a per-project basis.

May’s announcement seemed to support this theory to some degree, as one party told us it came in response to decreasing client demand for “traditional production work like TV, print and out of home.” And the agency’s two most recent big-name hires were a chief media officer and a new head of strategy.

But other sources implied the agency has been hiring new creatives in a long-term effort to transcend its reputation as a media-first shop best known for brand stunts that rely heavily on social media. The spokesperson declined to elaborate beyond the statement above.

Most of the current job listings at the company do concern media, social and data, though the team is also currently looking for a new senior copywriter. Expect more news to come from 360i.